MoveOn activists deliver petitions to Obama’s OFA offices in Gainesville, nationwide

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — MoveOn members delivered signed petitions requesting that President Obama order a federal investigation into Wall Street’s involvement in the foreclosure crisis to the Organizing for America (OFA) office at 4 p.m., Jan. 19.

Nine MoveOn members lead by Karen Epple, the local MoveOn coordinator, walked into the OFA office which is housed by the Alachua County Democratic Party headquarters, 901 NW Eighth Ave. in Gainesville, Fla.

Organizing for America is the community-organizing project of the Democratic National Committee that seeks to mobilize supporters in favor of Obama’s legislative priorities.

Protesters handed Celeste Rotonda, an intern working at the OFA, a box containing the petition and the signatures of those from Florida who had signed it, that read, “President Obama: Hold Wall Street banks accountable by fully investigating the big bank fraud that caused the housing crisis.”

Petitions with more than 220,000 signatures were delivered to more than 140 OFA offices on Jan. 19 as part of a national day of action called “Yes He Can.” The petition delivery came after the state attorneys general temporarily blocked a deal that would have given broad immunity to banks for their role in the housing crisis, according to a MoveOn press release.

Epple, MoveOn coordinator, said, “We are all going to be showing up in OFA offices across the country and Obama is gonna know that we are serious about this, that we really feel like he needs to not let the ‘banksters’ off the hook.”

Joihn Reiskind, chair of the Alachua County Democratic Party, responded positively to the exchange. “I think it sends a clear message, it shows how widespread the concern is,” he said.

Representatives for the national OFA were contacted in order to obtain a statement, but an official response has not yet been received.

The “Yes He Can” theme of the events is a take on President Obama’s 2008 election slogan “Yes We Can” and serves as a reminder to the promises Obama made during that campaign, according to Epple, who has been a member of MoveOn for six years and a council organizer for nearly as long.

“We are here at the Obama campaign office to let the president know that we the people who supported him last time around, and have been fighting for the 99 percent are counting on him to take full leadership.” she said

MoveOn, a progressive group of organizations that includes a nonprofit organization and a federal PAC, has had the petition available on its website for only a couple of weeks, according to Epple.

“This was really organic: people who went to the moveon.org page found the petition, there was not recruitment to ask people to sign it,” she said.

As of Thursday afternoon, more 358,477 signatures were attached to the petition nationwide with more than 180,526 from Florida, according to Epple.

After the petition was handed over, members of the Democratic Party, volunteers and MoveOn members stood around discussing the issues for the next hour. Reiskind, the Alachua County Democratic Party chair, observed the scene and said, “This is what it is all about: building coalitions is what politics is all about.”

Emilio Bruna, an adjunct economics professor at Sante Fe College, was present at the event and agreed that banking executives needed to be held accountable.

“Some of them are still in business and getting bonuses, it’s just awful,” he said. “Because of them we are giving a lesson to our younger generations that do whatever you have to, latch on and go for the money and nothing else is important; what kind of lessons are those?”

“We are holding him [the president] accountable,” Epple, MoveOn coordinator, said. “That is what he asked us to do.”